Thank Goodness for Freezers and Crockpots!

Creamy grain with splashes of brilliant red and flashes of tart sweet flavor laced with cinnamon. Golden brown and buttery outside and soft, feathery, pale on the inside. Slightly sweet, medium dark hot liquid smoothing across my palette. I call it all breakfast! Oatmeal with soy milk and spiced cranberry preserves stirred in, parker house rolls reheated from the freezer, hot blueberry-peach rooibos (red) tea, all made in under 10 minutes and a recipe for keeping me going through the morning! Even better, the kids have chosen breakfast from the freezer too - waffles for S and pumpkin pancakes for C. Every time I make waffles, pancakes, or muffins for breakfast, I freeze them and bag them so that I can pull them out any time and have hot breakfast in under a minute from the microwave. Tip: use a large cutting board or even a baking sheet, and place all of the items you want to freeze, such as muffins, on it and then place in the freezer. When they are frozen, you can safely put them all in a bag without them sticking together! This is called flash freezing.

Okay, so breakfast is under control. Lunch will be sandwiches. Dinner is my next problem. Tonight I work at 6, so A will eat with the kids while I have to eat earlier. What to make that A won't have to fuss with the moment he comes in the door, especially since he's not an avid cook? Often the solution is something from the crockpot, and tonight is no different. It's only supposed to be 75 degrees today, and we have the added wrinkle of tonight C is supposed to be having her first sleepover at a friend's house down the road, so I want something that can sit in the crockpot and still be good at 8:00 if that is when A finally gets to eat. My solution today is chili. I'll do our all-time favorite recipe, which also happens to be one of the healthiest recipes I've ever had. It is also a recipe that can be almost completely done locavore (eating local foods) and is definitely whole foods. No health mysteries, and it meets the needs for my dairy and egg yolk allergies and the Feingold diet we try to do for S's Asperger's Syndrome. Also, the greatest beauty of chili is that it freezes well and can be used in a variety of ways. I will freeze leftovers in 1 cup portions using those plastic re-usable snack containers then popping them out and putting two to a quart freezer bag. The frozen chili can be reheated and mixed with nacho cheese for a dip, put on top of baked potatoes, used to make chili fries, or eaten just as a bowl of chili.

S and C are picky, so S might eat the chili and C won't. As usual, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, rolls, and applesauce will be offered. Whenever I make fresh rolls, I put the extra ones in the freezer, so the family has a variety of rolls to choose from for dinner tonight.

Best Bean Chili
1 lb lean ground beef or turkey
1 1/2 c. chopped onion
1 c. chopped green pepper
2 tsp minced garlic
1 (15 oz) can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 (15 oz) can pinto beans, drained and rinsed
*Note: I mix and match 2-3 cans of beans, using kidney, pinto, black, butter, northern, etc.
3 (14.5 oz) cans diced tomatoes with green chiles or 3 cans diced tomatoes and 1-2 small cans diced chiles
2 T brown sugar
1 T unsweetened cocoa powder
2 T chili powder
1 tsp ground cumin

Brown meat in a skillet, adding onions, pepper, and garlic and cooking for 5 minutes more.
Place all ingredients in a 6 quart crockpot and cook on low for at least 5 hours and up to 12 hours.
Recipe from the Bean Education and Awareness Network (B.E.A.N.).